Before you criticize others, remember, they may not have had the same opportunities in life as you have had

His dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him.

in crowded rooms they would form words with their lips for each other's eyes

you once liked me, didn't you?, he asked. LIKED you- I LOVED you. Everybody loved you. You could've had anybody you wanted for the asking.

You're the only girl I've seen for a long time that actually did look like something blooming.

the cracked plate has to be retained in the pantry, has to be kept in service as a household necessity. It can never be warmed on the stove nor shuffled with the other plates in the dishpan; it will not be brought out for company but it will do to hold crackers late at night or to go into the ice-box with the left overs.

Once one is caught up into the material world not one person in ten thousand finds the time to form literary taste, to examine the validity of philosophic concepts for himself, or to form what, for lack of a better phrase, I might call the wise and tragic sense of life.